They make an unlikely duo—the onetime lead singer of the hardest-partying rock band in the world and the soft-voiced contemporary bluegrass singer and fiddler. And yet somehow, the pairing of Robert Plant and Alison Krauss makes perfect sense, if not on paper then certainly on the stage and in the studio. They’ve been collaborating for years and won five Grammies for their 2007 album Raising Sand, which appeared on some of the most prominent critical best-of lists that year. And Plant has gone on record saying that his work with Krauss permanently altered his musical direction and helped him reconnect with his own English country music background.
Both Krauss and Plant get to explore several American roots avenues in Raising Sand, an album of songs by such luminaries as Sam Philips, the Everly Brothers, Townes Van Zandt, and Doc Watson. But in the videos above, the pair—backed by a country band—mosey through two old Led Zeppelin songs renowned for their thunderous loudness and sweeping guitars. “Black Dog” (original here) begins with Jimmy Page’s unmistakable intro riff picked out on a banjo while Plant goofs around and attempts a two-step. It feels like we’re in for a novelty act, but when the two start singing harmonies, the strength of their musical bond is immediately apparent, even in what some might consider a butchering of an iconic tune. Krauss takes the lead vocal in “When the Levee Breaks” (original here) while Plant hangs back and strums a guitar. She turns the song into straight country, and mostly sells it, save the band’s thin, uninspired instrumental breakdowns and guitar solos that only vaguely recall the original. All-in-all it’s an interesting experiment in genre transposition, though I think we’re lucky to have been spared an album of Plant and Krauss re-inventing classic Zeppelin as contemporary Americana.
Do Milton Friedman and John Kenneth Galbraith debate in that great economics department in the sky? Both men died in 2006, after remarkably long and distinguished careers as two of the most widely read economists of the 20th century, yet I can only with great difficulty imagine them ever agreeing. Friedman, founder of the free market-oriented University of Chicago “school” of economics, scrutinized the world’s economies and found that a only minimum of government intervention makes for a maximum of freedom. The Canadian-born Galbraith, who served on Harvard’s faculty as well as under four U.S. Presidents, saw things differently, believing in the necessity of a strong state to ensure stability, efficiency, and equality. Both spent a great deal of time and energy communicating directly with the public, not just with popular books and commentaries on economic issues of the day, but with television programs too. You can watch Galbraith’s The Age ofUncertainty, which first aired on the BBC in 1977, above. Friedman’s “response” Free to Choose, broadcast on PBS in 1980, appears below.
The fifteen-episode Age of Uncertainty and the ten-episode Free to Choose both come down to the teachings of their star economists; you might think of them as extended lectures, with quite different conclusions, on the causes and effects of capitalism. But both expand upon this base of content with rich imagery, from a variety of creative visualizations (up to and including historical dramatization) of Galbraith’s words to Friedman’s travels far and wide, from his money-driven birthplace of New York City to the “haven for people who sought to make the most of their own abilities” of Hong Kong in search of real examples of the free market in action. The styles of dress may look dated, but the production value holds up, and the economic issues discussed have only grown more relevant with time. Whether you believe the government should keep a helping hand on the economy or keep its grubby mitts off it, both series have a wealth, as it were, of entertainment and education in store for you. As bitterly as Galbraithian statists and Friedmanite libertarians may argue, surely they can agree on the enjoyability of quality television.
The 1994 documentary above, Einstein’s Brain, is a curious artifact about an even stranger relic, the brain of the great physicist, extracted from his body hours after he died in 1955. The brain was dissected, then embarked on a convoluted misadventure, in several pieces, across the North American continent. Before Einstein’s Brain tells this story, it introduces us to our guide, Japanese scholar Kenji Sugimoto, who immediately emerges as an eccentric figure, wobbling in and out of view, mumbling awed phrases in Japanese. We encounter him in a darkened cathedral, staring up at a backlit stained-glass clerestory, praying, perhaps, though if he’s praying to anyone, it’s probably Albert Einstein. His first words in heavily accented English express a deep reverence for Einstein alone. “I love Albert Einstein,” he says, with religious conviction, gazing at a stained-glass window portrait of the scientist.
Sugimoto’s devotion perfectly illustrates what a Physics World article described as the cultural elevation of Einstein to the status of a “secular saint.” Sugimoto’s zeal, and the rather implausible events that follow this opening, have prompted many people to question the authenticity of his film and to accuse him of perpetrating a hoax. Some of those critics may mistake Sugimoto’s social awkwardness and wide-eyed enthusiasm for credulousness and unprofessionalism, but it is worth noting that he is experienced and credentialed as a professor in mathematics and science history at the Kinki University in Japan and, according to a title card, he “spent thirty years documenting Einstein’s life and person.”
For a full evaluation, see a poorly proofread but very well-sourced article at “bad science blog” Depleted Cranium that tells the complete story of Einstein’s brain, and supports Sugimoto’s tale by reference to several accounts. Of the documentary, we’re told that “based on all available data, the basic premise and the events shown in the documentary are indeed true.” In the film, Sugimoto travels across the U.S. in search of Dr. Thomas Harvey, the man who originally removed Einstein’s brain at Princeton. (See one of the original pathology photos, with added labels, of the brain above). Depleted Cranium continues to set the scene as follows:
Eventually, Sugimoto tracks down Thomas Harvey at his home in Kansas. When he requests to see the brain, Harvey brings out two glass jars containing the pieces. At this point, Sugimoto makes a shocking request: he asks Harvey if he could have a small piece of the brain to keep as a personal memento. Harvey says “I don’t see any reason why not” and proceeds to retrieve a carving knife and a cutting board from his kitchen. He cuts a small section from a sample he identifies as being part of Einstein’s brain stem and cerebellum and gives it to Sugimoto in a small container. In the final scene, Sugimoto celebrates by taking his piece of the brain to a local kereoke [sic] bar and singing a favorite Japanese song.
The notion that the bulk of Einstein’s brain would have ended up in a closet in Kansas seems strange enough. And as for Harvey: the pathologist shopped the brain around for decades—if not for profit, then for notoriety—even driving across the country with journalist Michael Paterniti in 1997 to deliver a large portion of the brain to Dr. Sandra Witelson of McMaster University in Ontario. Paterniti documented the road trip in his book Driving Mr. Albert, which appears to corroborate much of Sugimoto’s narrative, though the trip may itself have been a publicity stunt.
In addition to the brain, Einstein’s eyes were also removed, without authorization, by his ophthalmologist, who kept them in a safety deposit box (where they presumably remain). The entire story of Einstein’s remains is gruesomely outlandish, though one might consider it a modern celebrity example of the centuries-old practice of body snatching. If some or all of this intrigues you, you’ll appreciate Sugimoto’s documentary. Unfortunately, the video upload is rough. It was recorded from Swedish television, has Swedish subtitles, and is generally pretty low-res. However, as a title card at the opening tells us, “due to the extremely limited availability of this documentary, this will have to suffice until a copy of higher quality rises to the surface.”
Every year, Duke University’s Center for the Study of the Public Domain highlights major works that would have entered the public domain had the copyright law that prevailed until 1978 still remained in effect today. That law (established in 1909) allowed works to remain under copyright for a maximum of 56 years — which means that 2014 would have welcomed into the public domain works first published in 1957. Some highlights (from the longer list) include:
Books
Jack Kerouac, On the Road
Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged
Dr. Seuss, How the Grinch Stole Christmas and The Cat in the Hat
Studs Terkel, Giants of Jazz
Ian Fleming, From Russia, with Love
Movies
12 Angry Men (Henry Fonda, Lee J. Cobb, Jack Klugman, Ed Begley, and more)
A Farewell to Arms (Rock Hudson and Jennifer Jones)
Jailhouse Rock (Elvis Presley)
The Seventh Seal (written and directed by Ingmar Bergman and starring Max von Sydow and Bengt Ekerot)
Funny Face (Audrey Hepburn and Fred Astaire)
Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas)
Music
“That’ll Be the Day” and “Peggy Sue” (Buddy Holly, Jerry Allison, and Norman Petty)
“Great Balls of Fire” (Otis Blackwell and Jack Hammer)
“Wake Up, Little Susie” (Felice and Boudleaux Bryant)
Elvis Presley’s hits: “All Shook Up” (Otis Blackwell and Elvis Presley) and “Jailhouse Rock” (Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller)
The musical “West Side Story” (music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and book by Arthur Laurents)
Art
Dali’s “Celestial Ride” and “Music: the Red Orchestra”
Edward Hopper’s “Western Motel”
Picasso’s “Las Meninas” set of paintings
Under the current copyright regime, you’ll have to wait another 39 years — until 2053 — before these works hit the commons.
Note: If you’re wondering how many works of art entered the public domain in 2014, the answer is simple: 0. As the Duke site notes, “Not a single published work” is entering the public domain in 2014. “In fact, in the United States, no publication will enter the public domain until 2019.”
When New York City hosted The World’s Fair in 1964, Isaac Asimov, the prolific sci-fi author and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, took the opportunity to wonder what the world would look like 50 years hence — assuming the world survived the nuclear threats of the Cold War. Writing in The New York Times, Asimov imagined a world that you might partly recognize today, a world where:
“Gadgetry will continue to relieve mankind of tedious jobs. Kitchen units will be devised that will prepare ‘automeals,’ heating water and converting it to coffee; toasting bread; frying, poaching or scrambling eggs, grilling bacon, and so on. Breakfasts will be ‘ordered’ the night before to be ready by a specified hour the next morning.”
“Communications will become sight-sound and you will see as well as hear the person you telephone. The screen can be used not only to see the people you call but also for studying documents and photographs and reading passages from books. Synchronous satellites, hovering in space will make it possible for you to direct-dial any spot on earth, including the weather stations in Antarctica.”
“[M]en will continue to withdraw from nature in order to create an environment that will suit them better. By 2014, electroluminescent panels will be in common use. Ceilings and walls will glow softly, and in a variety of colors that will change at the touch of a push button.”
“Robots will neither be common nor very good in 2014, but they will be in existence.”
“The appliances of 2014 will have no electric cords, of course, for they will be powered by long- lived batteries running on radioisotopes.”
“[H]ighways … in the more advanced sections of the world will have passed their peak in 2014; there will be increasing emphasis on transportation that makes the least possible contact with the surface. There will be aircraft, of course, but even ground travel will increasingly take to the air a foot or two off the ground.”
“[V]ehicles with ‘Robot-brains’ … can be set for particular destinations … that will then proceed there without interference by the slow reflexes of a human driver.”
“[W]all screens will have replaced the ordinary set; but transparent cubes will be making their appearance in which three-dimensional viewing will be possible.”
“[T]he world population will be 6,500,000,000 and the population of the United States will be 350,000,000.” And later he warns that if the population growth continues unchecked, “All earth will be a single choked Manhattan by A.D. 2450 and society will collapse long before that!” As a result, “There will, therefore, be a worldwide propaganda drive in favor of birth control by rational and humane methods and, by 2014, it will undoubtedly have taken serious effect.” [See our Walt Disney Family Planning cartoon from earlier this week.]
“Ordinary agriculture will keep up with great difficulty and there will be ‘farms’ turning to the more efficient micro-organisms. Processed yeast and algae products will be available in a variety of flavors.”
“The world of A.D. 2014 will have few routine jobs that cannot be done better by some machine than by any human being. Mankind will therefore have become largely a race of machine tenders. Schools will have to be oriented in this direction.… All the high-school students will be taught the fundamentals of computer technology will become proficient in binary arithmetic and will be trained to perfection in the use of the computer languages that will have developed out of those like the contemporary “Fortran.”
“[M]ankind will suffer badly from the disease of boredom, a disease spreading more widely each year and growing in intensity. This will have serious mental, emotional and sociological consequences, and I dare say that psychiatry will be far and away the most important medical specialty in 2014.”
“[T]he most glorious single word in the vocabulary will have become work!” in our “a society of enforced leisure.”
Isaac Asimov wasn’t the only person during the 60s who peered into the future in a fairly prescient way. You can find a few more on-the-mark predictions from contemporaries below:
Note: This post originally appeared on Open Culture last August. If there was ever a time to show it again, it’s today. So, with your indulgence, we’re giving it an encore performance.
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There are myriad New Year’s Eve customs worldwide. In Japan, toshikoshi soba noodles are eaten to bring in the coming year. In North America, finding someone to share a New Year’s Eve kiss with as the clock winds down has become a boon to the romantically-challenged. In Germany, however, a different tradition has taken form: every year on December 31st, TV networks broadcast an 18-minute-long black and white two-hander comedy skit.
In 1963, Germany’s Norddeutscher Rundfunk television station recorded a sketch entitled Dinner For One, performed by the British comics Freddie Frinton and May Warden. The duo depicted an aging butler serving his aristocratic mistress, Miss Sophie, dinner on the occasion of her 90th birthday.
Although four additional spots have been set at the table, the nonagenarian’s friends have long since passed away, and the butler is forced to take their places in drinking copious amounts of alcohol while toasting Miss Sophie’s health. Hilarity, as it is wont to do in such cases, ensues.
Since its initial recording, the clip has become a New Year’s Eve staple in Germany. Although Dinner For One has never been broadcast in the U. S. or Canada, the clip has spread throughout Europe to Norway, Finland, Estonia, Lithuania, Austria, Switzerland, and beyond the continent’s shores, to South Africa and Australia. In Sweden, a bowdlerized 11-minute version of the clip has been produced, where, for decency’s sake, much of the butler’s boozing was excised alongside its attendant comedic effect. In Denmark, after the national television network failed to broadcast the sketch in 1985, an avalanche of viewer complaints has guaranteed its subsequent yearly appearance. Although the category is now defunct, the clip held the Guinness World Record for Most Frequently Repeated TV Program. As for why the video’s garnered so much attention? No one’s really sure. The Wall Street Journal’s Todd Buell posits that the sketch’s easy to understand English combined with a German longing for security and simplicity may have led to its iconic status. To me, however, it seems that the finely tuned physical comedy translates readily beyond any linguistic boundaries, and simply hit the right note at the right time.
Above, you can view the original 18-minute comedic opus and celebrate New Year’s day in the same way that much of Europe brought in 2014 (don’t mind the German introduction — the video is in English). In future years, you can always find Dinner for One in our collection 4,000+ Free Movies Online: Great Classics, Indies, Noir, Westerns, Documentaries & More.
From all of us at Open Culture to you, have a happy new year!
On January 1, 1943, the American folk music legend Woody Guthrie jotted in his journal a list of 33 “New Years Rulin’s.” Nowadays, we’d call them New Year’s Resolutions. Adorned by doodles, the list is down to earth by any measure. Family, song, taking a political stand, personal hygiene — they’re the values or aspirations that top his list. You can click here to view the list in a larger format. Below, we have provided a transcript of Guthrie’s Rulin’s.
1. Work more and better
2. Work by a schedule
3. Wash teeth if any
4. Shave
5. Take bath
6. Eat good — fruit — vegetables — milk
7. Drink very scant if any
8. Write a song a day
9. Wear clean clothes — look good
10. Shine shoes
11. Change socks
12. Change bed cloths often
13. Read lots good books
14. Listen to radio a lot
15. Learn people better
16. Keep rancho clean
17. Dont get lonesome
18. Stay glad
19. Keep hoping machine running
20. Dream good
21. Bank all extra money
22. Save dough
23. Have company but dont waste time
24. Send Mary and kids money
25. Play and sing good
26. Dance better
27. Help win war — beat fascism
28. Love mama
29. Love papa
30. Love Pete
31. Love everybody
32. Make up your mind
33. Wake up and fight
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